Lawson Purdy
New York City's Tax Commissioner (1906-1917) and a leading Georgist administrator who won the separate listing of land and building values on assessment rolls and rose to leadership in the National Tax Association.
Overview
Lawson Purdy (c. 1863 - 1959) was an American tax administrator and Georgist reformer, converted, like many civic reformers of his generation, by Henry George's single-tax doctrine. He served as secretary of the New York Tax Reform Association (1896-1906) and then as president of the New York City Department of Taxes and Assessments (1906-1917), where his signature achievement was securing legislation requiring public assessment rolls (1902) and, from 1906, the separate listing of land value and total (land-plus-improvement) value for every assessed property in the city — a practical administrative step toward taxing land value distinctly, short of the full single tax itself. He was also a leading figure in the National Tax Association in its founding decade, and later directed the New York Charity Organization Society (1918-1933).
Georgist Context
Gaffney and Harrison's The Corruption of Economics names Purdy among the wave of Georgist-influenced officials and campaigners active around the turn of the twentieth century, alongside figures such as Tom L. Johnson and Louis F. Post — part of the movement's push to embed land-value assessment inside mainstream US tax administration even as academic economists such as E.R.A. Seligman worked to blunt the single-tax movement's proposals.
See Also
- Henry George — whose Progress and Poverty converted Purdy to the land-tax cause
- The Corruption of Economics (book page) — names Purdy among the movement's administrative campaigners
- Tom L. Johnson — fellow Georgist official of the same era, Mayor of Cleveland
- Land Value Tax — the reform Purdy's assessment-roll reforms moved New York City toward
- Gaffney's Georgist City-Growth Case Studies — documents the Somers land-value mapping system Purdy carried from Cleveland (Mayor Tom Johnson) to New York
Sources
- Gaffney, Harrison & Feder (1994), The Corruption of Economics — wiki book page — discovery source; used for Purdy's identification as a Georgist campaigner active in the movement's establishment-era organizations.
- Henry George School of Social Science, "New York Tax Reform Association, 1891-1924" (collection biographical note) — used for his NYTRA secretary term (1896-1906), Department of Taxes and Assessments presidency dates (1906-1917), death year (1959, at age 95), and Charity Organization Society directorship (1918-1933).